I’m a bit worried that you’re going to accuse me of being impossible to please where Kaguya-sama wa Kokurasetai: Tensai-tachi no Renai Zunousen is concerned, and honestly I wouldn’t blame you.  I mean, it delivered an episode that managed for 2/3 of its length to address one of my major complaints with the series – that is to say, two chapters without any narration to speak of.  But it still didn’t capture me, which I can only ascribe to the fact that comedy is an extremely personal thing.

Truthfully, this episode had almost everything I would want from an ep of Kaguya-sama.  It mostly dispensed with the narrator (two out of three ain’t bad), it definitely softened things up between Kaguya and Miyuki, and the Shaft-iness was generally toned down to a tolerable level.  The only thing it didn’t do was make me laugh all that much, but if you’re going to pick one thing you want a comedy to do, that would be the one.  It’s irritating because the series has certainly proved itself to be likeable enough, which just makes me that much more anxious to embrace it.  But comedy is what it is – you can’t force it.

In truth, after five episodes I’d almost be prepared to say that Chika is the true main character here.  If one looks at it objectively, she gets as much (or near enough as to be a wash) screen time as the two romantic leads.  She gets almost all of the big laugh lines and physical comedy moments.  Hell, she even got her own super deluxe rotoscoped ED.  That’s fine, as she does have her comic moments to be sure – but I’m already starting to find her act wearing a bit thin.  It’s like a Manzai where the boke and tsukkomi are out of balance – they have to be 50-50 partners for the act to work.  Fujiwara is pure boke, that’s for sure, and for me at least the show would work better if they dialed her back a bit.

I didn’t have any problems with any of the three chapters this week, apart from none of them making me laugh as much as I wanted.  I did like the “menacing glare” moment in the first one, and there were bits and pieces of charm in the training sequence that was the second.  It’s unfortunate that the best premise of the three segments this week was also the one drowned in narration – I did like the setup of the aiaigasa bit, and it really did show of these two idiots at their most endearingly idiotic.

Perhaps the most significant moment of the episode came after the ED in fact, because it seems as if the much-teased side character and student council treasurer Ishigami Yuu is finally going to make his formal debut next week.  From where I sit a change in the dynamic can only be a good thing – really, I have nothing to lose – and I’m looking forward to seeing what Ishigami’s addition can bring to the overall mix.  I’m grasping at straws a bit here, but if nothing else Kaguya-sama wa Kokurasetai has managed to make me want to like it, which is certainly better than nothing.